I am better with Apple

Being a planner of marketinging, I don’t often get to experience the joys of joining a brand as a real human.  So imagine my excitement if you will when last week I bought an iPhone.

I’ve been with Orange for over 8 years and it was a kind of a big decision to leave them.  But I love Apple more than I love Orange so had to wrench myself away from their balloon animals and bright future.  I was also interested to see what O2’s welcome experience would be like – do real people care about this?  Or do they just want to get their mitts on the shiny new toy?

Leaving Orange was over in exactly 1 minute.  

Orange: Hello.  Welcome to Orange loyalty.

Me: Hello.  I want my PAC code please

Orange: Oh okay.  Why’s that?

Me: I want an iPhone

Orange: Oh okay then.  We’ll sent it out within 5 days.  Anything else I can help you with?

Me: *Stunned Silence* Um. No thanks 

Orange: Okay. Thanks for calling Orange.  Bye.

Bye then… as I stared at my phone and slumped back into my chair, I felt… gutted.  There was no tears.  No begging. No ‘oh please don’t… please stay lovely Lydia you loyal friend of 8 years’.   I am dead to them.  Just another traitor tempted by the shiny Apple toy.  I quickly recover from the shock and start getting excited. Tomorrow I will wait in line with the other Applenerds to be the one of the first to enter iPhone paradise.  Or so I thought.

Monday’s pre-ordering fiasco didn’t fill me with confidence as to whether I actually would get a phone within the time limit of the month I had left until Orange would coldly cut off my contract.  O2’s arrogant tone and lack of apology had left me feeling dirty plus there was rumour that most stores would have less than 20 handsets each.  

Before we get into the events of the day I just want us to stop and think about that for a minute.  Less than 20 handsets per store.  Reports of the day said that some stores had only two 16GB handsets.  I’m sorry but what the fuck were O2 thinking?  Was it deliberate?  Some odd marketing hype machine stunt to make grown men cry with anxiety and wonder if they would ever get to see one of these rare objects of lust and desire? What they should have been thinking was: mmm we’re a phone shop perhaps we should have enough stock so we can SELL SOME PHONES?

I digress.  On the Friday morning I’m on the train at 7am and still not confident about this mad endeavor.  I’ve never been the first in line for anything so I console myself with the truth that even if I don’t succeed at least I will have experienced nerd/loser line waiting first hand.  I arrive at the Apple store at 8am (the store opens at the arbitrary time of 8.02am).  There’s a huge scrum of press surrounding the entrance.  Slightly perturbed as to the whereabouts of the actual customers, I ask where the big queue is.  I’m directed around the corner to a moderate queue of neatly arranged people.  I join the back and get chatting to a few people thinking that I probably won’t get in the store for ages so I’ll just hang around until I can go to work, right?  WRONG.  Some nice person from Starbucks gives me coffee, I chat to a journalist, and then we’re rushed into the store at precisely 8.04am. 

Now, if you’re a boxer, or a footballer, or any sort of celebrity, then you will be able to empathise with what it was like to be rushed into the Apple store on that morning and be greeted by paparazzi cameras flashin away and the entire Apple store staff lining the building whooping and cheering like you’d just won a gold medal.  My initial British reaction was to think that it was all a bit embarrassing and bloody stupid.  It’s JUST A PHONE.  Total non-news.  But then the fever must have got to me as I found myself clapping and whooping along with them whilst running up the stairs to join the queue of wide-eyed excitables.  Great start right?  Correct.  I’m in the store.  It’s 5 past 8.  They’re playing celebratory Hollywood blockbuster music of some description and THE QUEUE IS MOVING.  The crowd goes bonkers as the first person chooses his phone.  He raises his iPhone box and runs chariot’s of fire-style, kissing it for the cameras. He jogs to one of the computer stations to start the registration process accompanied by various telly people with clipboards and cameras.  More people get their phones and I start getting excited.  More press arrive and more pictures are taken.  I’m 15th from the front! So close to iPhone nirvana! But then it all goes wrong. The queue stops.  No one is moving because no one has left yet.  And why has no one left yet?  Because O2’s system has crashed.

A quick search on the interwebs says that there’s a combined total of 1,300 Apple, Carphone Warehouse, and O2 stores nationwide.  Let’s say that there’s a generous average of 5 people per store at this precise moment trying to register their precious iPhone.  That’s 6,500 registrations trying to get through the system.  Now, I don’t know anything about load testing or network capacity and whatnot but I know someone who does: my Mum and this is her bag.  I ask her whether she thinks that six thousand people trying to simultaneously register their phone would understandably be a strain on any system.   She’s looks at me and says ‘No, not really.  That’s bugger all.’  ‘Oh really?’ I ask.  She then reels off a lot of nerd-speak about DB2 systems, MQ queuing system, buffer pools, and tuned databases.  In real terms what she’s saying is someone fucked up big time.  No shit.

It’s now 9am and I’ve been waiting in the same place for about 40 mins.  I ring work.  Nick gets excited and tells me to stay put.  So stay put I do for a further two hours.  In the meantime I make friends with my fellow queueees.  It’s an odd mix of people.  There’s the usual web developer types who can barely grow facial hair yet own their own company and presumably make millions.  I chat to him for a bit about web stuff.  Another person is a nearly retired police officer and a full time hypnotherapist.  He asks me about how he can make his website better and I tell him.  We then all have a chat about search engine optimisation and everyone is still very jolly.  We make idle chit chat about nearly everything but now it’s 10.30am and patience is wearing thin.  More free coffee from Starbucks arrives.  The Apple store staff have nothing to do except stand around and field questions about what the fuck is taking so long.   The entertainment provided in the form of press, telly cameras, and paparazzi has subsided and now I’m no longer at an event, I’m just standing in a stationary queue and getting progressively more hungry (no breakfast) and thirsty (no tea, only coffee). 

At 11am the Apple store bigwigs have decided that people can either stay and wait or leave their details to be called later when the system is working.  I decide on the latter because I’m at this point ready to murder indiscriminately because I have had four coffees and still no tea.  I arrive at the office feeling dejected and exhausted with no iPhone to show off to my questioning colleagues.

I ambitiously pop back at lunchtime and the system still isn’t working.  I pop back after work when all the O2 shops are CLOSED and you guessed it, it still isn’t working.  Why isn’t it working? Because O2 can’t run a bath, let alone a phone shop.

Things that made me laugh that day:

1.  Apple had to run XP on their systems to run Internet Explorer – the only browser compatible with O2’s registration system.

2. The fact that everyone agreed that O2 were idiots (read cunts) but Apple were still awesome

This is a lolsome picture I found on Macrumours:

I eventually got my iPhone on the Saturday afternoon after being rung up by the Apple store as promised.  I was wizzed to the front of the queue, got the phone, registered it, and paid for it in under 30 minutes.  

Lessons we can learn from this epic failure of a product launch:

1. Do a load test.

2. Do a load test.

3. Do a load test.

4. Oh and do a load test.

5. If you haven’t done a load test be nice and say sorry when things go wrong.  

6.  Get the stock sorted out prior to people actually turning up at your store wanting to buy said stock.

7. Just because the brand you are partnering with is awesome and arrogant, doesn’t mean you can behave like an awesome arrogant arsehole.  You’re the shit second rate provider that is a means to an end.  That end being loving Apple beyond reason.

Other lessons to be learnt from this epic failure of a welcome process:

1. Where’s my treat?  To date there has been no shiny welcome pack through my door.  I want a glossy box that cost one pound a pack bursting with information about all the things that make joining O2 the bestest decision I’ve ever made eva!  What do I get instead?  The cheapest paper leaflet that marketing man has ever conceived.  I’ve just committed to spending £35 a month with you for the foreseeable future and THIS is all I get as thanks?  A shit leaflet, a few texts, and an email? Thanks O2 you bunch of cheap pricks.

The reasons why O2 don’t have a nice shiny welcome box is because there is nothing to be welcomed to.  NOTHING. (Well, not including the reason I joined them in the first place: the iPhone).  They have the O2 Dome, the wireless festival, and rugby.  But I’m interested in none of that mainstream rubbish. Call me a muso snob but I have no desire to see Kylie at the dome or any clamouring for a VIP box at Arsenal thanks all the same.

I’m beginning to miss Orange already.  Only a bit mind.  I have iPhone to mitigate the small sense of lose I may feel.  And what a phone it is.  It’s a lightsaber, it’s a remote control, it’s awesome.  But as the Wired blog says it drains it’s battery faster than a toddler in a desert.  That is the only downside.  

Here it is.  Look at it.  So shiny.

I am me

Here is Orange’s new advert.  Half baked you think? They clearly don’t have any form of social media planner (not like our lovely Helen) as I can’t find a decent copy of it anywhere that I can embed here.

Worse still is the ‘I am’ site.  Woefully underwhelming and I’m being kind.  It doesn’t even follow the brand guidelines.  How on earth that got signed off I have no idea, but looks hastily thrown together with no thought or care.  Such a shame as ‘I am who I am because of everyone in my life’ is a decent idea on which to base a campaign.  The only redeeming feature is how you find the dreadful site.   There’s no URL on the zillions of press ads scattered about the freesheets this morning, instead you are instructed to search for ‘I Am’ and lo and behold!  Up pops the first entry on paid search ‘I Am Everyone dot com’.  This, apparently, is a popular call to action in Japan – I like it, expect more soon.

Never mind, guerrilla marketing is much more fun: check out I am orange a hastily thrown together blog of pictures of orange people.  Awesome.  I’m trying to get it higher on the search rankings so please click and republish!  

Oh, and while we’re on the subject of ill-conceived marketing ideas: this morning’s iPhone fiasco has me angered greatly.  To my shame I love Apple more than I love Orange.  I’m considering leaving them after 10 years to get my greedy geek mitts on the new iPhone.  I’m rapidly going off the idea as I was faced with this rather cold message as I clicked hopefully through to the shop. 

 

Come back on 10 July for more information.

What?

Come back?!

No please?  No Sorry?… No nothing.  My Mother told me manners cost nothing.  This tiny piece of messaging is as cold and unfriendly as I expected.  Still my desire for an iPhone is overriding my desire for a fluffy friendly huggable mobile phone operator.  

I’ll keep you updated on how the change over process goes. So far I’m not impressed. And I haven’t even made up my mind to buy the shiny toy.  And this isn’t helping.

Hello Balloons

I spent most of my day faffing around with this balloon idiocy. I’m assuming everyone else in digital advertising did too because twitter was very quiet for the entire afternoon.

Apart from the almost breaking teh internest with the pesky flash it is actually marvelous. Well done POKE

Here’s my rather sad balloon. You can boost him too if you like here

You may notice that my bobbing balloon in the corner there is rather reluctant to join the race. And you should be noticing many balloons ambling across the page too. But no. Somehow I’ve been excluded. *Sad face* Never mind. I’m hoping the race just hasn’t reached me yet.

The game play itself is stupidly simple and slightly tedious. There’s no real chance of winning the big prize. Probably little chance of winning any of the other prizes actually. It is really about the ‘taking part’. But what is really brilliant about it is you can just dip in and out. A little bit of engagement; a little bit of silliness; and a whole heap of free advertising for Orange. I assume it will also sweep up a whole heap of gongs.

Nick joined in too. I loled.